


so widely open

by sayounarahitori



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Getting Together, M/M, Slow Burn, Unreliable Narrator, Yuta doesn't have a gaydar: the fic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-04
Updated: 2020-12-04
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:49:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,553
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27717728
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sayounarahitori/pseuds/sayounarahitori
Summary: It's not like Yuta doesn't have an idea of what becoming an SM trainee might entail.He knows he will have to leave everything behind, and for the most part, he's ready. He knows there won't be place for the usual fun to be had by people his age, he knows he's basically throwing his youth to the wind, he knows it will be particularly hard for him as a foreigner.There are risks, too; he might not end up debuting after all. There can be all kinds of scandals. Someone might take a disliking to him, from fellow trainee to a higher-up in the company. These and countless other possibilities that he's sure he has accounted for.Yuta is ready. Yuta miscalculates.
Relationships: Mark Lee/Nakamoto Yuta
Comments: 21
Kudos: 161
Collections: NCT Bigbang Round 1





	so widely open

**Author's Note:**

> this fic has been in works (mostly in my brain) for almost a year, and i'm not even done yet. nevertheless, I really really wanted to at least start posting it, mostly because of this wonderful big bang event and because of my amazing artist!
> 
> please observe the WONDERFUL art [moony](https://twitter.com/fallinfleur) has drawn for this [here](https://twitter.com/fallinfleur/status/1334503872149278723). her Yuta is absolutely my favorite Yuta ever ;;; thank you for your kindness and your lovely art!
> 
> Some notes:  
> • I don't usually like putting labels on characters in fic, preferring to leave it to people's interpretations, but due to the nature of the fic, some characters (even off-screen ones) will have their sexuality presumed, discussed and stated  
> • there will be some background ships and like… assumptions? of relationships. by Yuta. they are all vague mentions though.  
> • if you’re one of the people who keeps notice of canon compliance and double checks every date, i apologise; I usually am one of those people, but this time I knew if I didn’t just kinda wing it, i’d never fucking finish this fic and that… took priority. (I still checked waaay too much shit, lmao.)
> 
> as always, thanks to [doyoubuns](https://twitter.com/doyoubuns) for being the best, ever.
> 
> i hope you enjoy!

ぽっかりと空いたその穴を  
僕に隠さないで見せておくれよ  
あなたの正体を あなたの存在を  
そっと包み込むように

This [hole](https://youtu.be/vo2YpWSI40E), so widely open  
don't hide it from me, let me see it  
Your true colours, your existence  
so that I can gently wrap myself up in [them](https://randomeighter.livejournal.com/7429.html)

Despite what someone might think, Yuta is ready for a lot of things when he joins SM.

He's ready for arduous hours of training, he's ready to miss out on the fun he might otherwise have as a young man, he's ready to be pushed aside in favor of other people that are understandably better than him at this or that.

Maybe he's not ready for how much or how quickly he grows fond of the trainees that surround him, despite the language barrier. Still, he figures, it's not a bad thing — they're just getting closer, which will definitely help in the future, with their debut looming on the horizon.

Then Hansol leaves.

Yuta can't say he didn’t see it happening. He should have, but — maybe he wasn't seeing anything at all. It happens quietly, and the next day they have to go to practice, and Hansol won’t be there.

And Yuta is fine.

But late at night, his mind spinning, he can't stop thinking: what could he have done to prevent this, what if he actually caused this, how arrogant it would be to assume he had any part in it? Their relationship was never… anything specific, but he would be lying if he said there wasn't something there.

And this is when, lying in a bed surrounded by snoring boys who might one day become his members, if only he can hold on, if only he is strong enough, he decides: he can't jeopardize his future — their future — with unneeded affection, with bonds that might cost him something bigger. They're all close, sure, but he can't get too attached, too deep. He won't be weak.

If others notice him being… colder, in the following months, they don't mention it; everyone knows he and Hansol were friends.

And yet, in all those weeks, Yuta can't manage to send an unfinished message to him.

The pain fades, amidst more training and their debut looming on the horizon, and as everything else seems to be progressing smoothly, Yuta softens, thinking that okay, he can have some platonic relationships, as a treat.

Against any possible romantic entanglements though, he barricades himself from all sides.

He laughs off Taeyong's neediness, he avoids Doyoung's warmth, he ignores Jaehyun's miserable attempts at courting (what is it, 19th century?). He doesn't know if any of them are seriously interested in anything or if he's just hyper-aware of all the possibilities, but he is not taking chances.

Others can do whatever they want. He watches as Johnny and Ten grow close, and closer, and closer, and watches as they suffer through the fallout of whatever happened — he doesn't want to pry, so he's spared the details, but it's still something that can't be fully avoided. He notes as Doyoung chasing after Taeyong's affection and attention slowly morphs into Taeyong reaching back out, and now it's him being denied (Yuta's not getting into this weird mating dance). He listens to Johnny solemnly telling Mark how to treat women right, and takes great pleasure in spooking them right out of the conversation.

That's why, when they lose— when he— when Sicheng leaves for WayV, he takes it in stride.

Members sending him pitying looks can fuck right off.

Despite the popular opinion, Yuta has never been in love with Sicheng — aside from everything else, he would never fall for a straight boy (unlike Ten), — but, well. This is when he learns that it doesn't have to be romantic for you to get too attached.

So that's another lesson.

And Yuta is not an idiot, he knows he can't just stop being attached to his members. He knows it's natural. He knows he can also still meet Sicheng, just as he can and will see Ten, Kun and others. But he pushes and pushes and pushes at his feelings until they can't bother him, until he is able to shake the bothersome emotions out of his heart, his head, his body. He takes up physical training with Jaehyun and Taeil. He relearns how to spend time by himself. He reminds himself, over and over, what he's here for.

The problem — the problem is Mark.

He never expects Mark.

*

Mark is maybe the most awkwardly straight person Yuta happens to know.

At some point he mentions it to Taeil because being tired of heterosexuality is a usual common topic in their room, and because Donghyuck has made Taeil’s bed his home lately, he inevitably jumps in to share his own Mark dish, and next thing he knows he's discussing it with Johnny.

"What does that make the rest of us then," Johnny snorts.

"Well, you're the most functional straight person I know," Yuta replies without hesitation — because weird Ten thing aside, that's the general vibe Yuta gets.

Johnny looks at him curiously, as if he was expecting something different. Yuta doesn't know what, but the conversation switches to something else after that, and he can’t be sure if it’s because the subject of sexuality was raised, or something else.

He never made a secret out of it, but never announced it outright, either. Personally, Yuta thinks it’s rather goddamn obvious, but no one really talks about it, not at first. Slowly, some conversations arise here and there, but they’re tentative and a bit stilted.

They don’t talk about it, but somehow, Yuta still knows that Mark has had some relationships with girls, and they were very awkward and barely existing, but, you know. Yuta doesn’t hold it against him. Relationships are hard even when you’re not an SM trainee. Just the same as Mark must know about Yuta, because everybody knows. Sometimes Yuta wishes he was even a bit interested in girls so he could be the cool senpai Mark so obviously craves, but, well, he guesses Johnny will do.

He doesn't like to admit that it's a much more selfish feeling, that he probably wants to be someone Mark looks up to more than Mark needs a figure like that.

Or maybe, he wanted it, long before — but now, now he's someone much more important: a friend Mark can share his burdens with, even if he rarely actually spills unless severely exhausted, or drunk (which happened, like, once and Yuta was mildly terrified and kinda wishes to have a warning next time).

Yuta wouldn't trade this position for anything.

*

Yuta doesn’t really remember how they became friends — the early days have long since blended together into a whirlpool of memories that are too tender, too fragile to just prod at them. He can only recall random glimpses here and there: more good than bad, just because he is like that, just because his mind tends to discard all the bad moments, with time.

He wanders the lanes of his own memory sometimes and tries to recall if he’s ever resented Mark, even a little, the kind of feeling that creeps around the edges on the bad days, when you can’t stop seeing yourself as just a pretty face, just one of the (very) background dancers. Yuta doesn’t entertain those thoughts for long because they are useless, and he doesn’t want to be that person. He won’t be that person, not anymore.

But all Yuta remembers is Mark’s eager expression, “hyung, I did good?”, his Korean better than Yuta's, but still not as natural, not as fast as a native’s, and smiles blooming on his own face unbidden in response. He remembers ruffling Mark’s hair, and always, always praising him — because he deserved it, but also because it was Mark. No matter what, they would stick together. No matter what, they stick together.

Mark is the person who sits beside him the night after Sicheng finally leaves the dorm for good, and watches some mediocre anime with him late into the night. A couple hours in Yuta, like an idiot, finally remembers enough to ask if Mark would like him to find something with subtitles, or, or _something_ — but Mark just shakes his head, and smiles just a little bit, and says that he liked trying to guess the situation by Yuta’s reactions.

And it's not like it was that bad, not like he really needed someone there — but even Yuta can't deny that it's nice, having Mark with him.

That's all it is, for a while.

*

Maybe it starts somewhere around their first Japan concerts.

They've known that the tour was coming for a while now, grown accustomed to the idea, put hours of work preparing for it — but nothing can prepare him for the reality of Saitama Super Arena being filled with green, people shouting their names and cheering extra loud when he speaks in his mother tongue. This, he knows, is what he worked for, this is why he pushed through all the exhaustion and despair, through hours alone, feeling like he could connect to no one, and people leaving, leaving, always leaving. It's all in the past, it's all been worth it, he feels now. All the times he could've quit, when he was actually considering it, long and painful hours in bed, alone — and here he is. There they all are.

The energy and happiness seems to burst out of him, prompting him to engulf Taeyong in many hugs both on stage and behind, to grin, unabashedly, at Jungwoo, to reach out and kiss Doyoung when he least expects it. (Doyoung never expects it which is easily the best part of it.)

"Mark!" he yells after the first concert is done, rushing to ruffle his hair — Mark flinches at first, but then allows it — and then, in a spur of a moment, "Wanna come to Osaka with me after?"

It's not something he ever suggested or even thought about, but somehow, the elation he feels comes out like this — just wanting to share the comfort of his childhood home and his hometown with someone else. With his friend.

Mark looks shocked, and Yuta doesn’t blame him, but then his expression turns sour and almost upset.

"Ah, damn, hyung, I would love to, but I’m pretty sure there’s stuff I can’t miss — well, plane is booked already, for one, but it’s like, the super group practices, plus I promised Taeyong-hyung to work on our new song, and it’s, like. Yeah. Really sorry.”

Mark seems genuinely apologetic, and he even promises to check if maybe he can change his flight, and Yuta smiles easily despite his insides being all twisted.

"Ah, that's okay. I did just spring it up on you. I’ll just ask someone else, right, Markie?” he ruffles his hair once more and rushes off.

Somehow, he never does.

Maybe it is exactly that moment that starts it — maybe somewhere deep inside, Yuta always just wants to be chasing something he can't get.

*

Being on tour brings a shift into the groups’ dynamics that Yuta couldn’t fully anticipate. Oh, he knew it would be an experience of another level, not compared to just flying to Japan or Russia or Chile for a festival or a showcase, but there’s something about touring together — always switching roommates, finding themselves sitting next to each other on a bus or a plane, all the new exciting places, especially once they come to America and Canada and Johnny and Mark are saddled with constantly helping them around.

Yuta takes to springing random questions on Mark: what's the best way to say this? what do you say when that happens? how do people here usually apologise? — all simple questions, coming from genuine interest and need to know and be prepared in the beginning, but then at some point he realises that Mark seems to like helping, explaining — likes feeling useful, Yuta surmises. So he asks him more, even when he doesn't really need to know all of these things. He asks, and Mark answers, and Yuta can't really help exclaiming how cool and smart Mark is, nor can he help noticing how Mark almost preens at the praise.

And so he goes on, and on, maybe even pushing it (but doesn't he always, always push it too far), except that what starts as a bit of teasing slowly loses the edge until all that's left is genuine compliments that Mark seems to take in like someone starved.

And Yuta, well… Yuta is also a people-pleaser. Or, at least, he likes pleasing the people he likes.

And of course he likes Mark — it's impossible not to like Mark.

He just.. doesn't anticipate liking him to this degree. Doesn't immediately realise he gravitates to Mark even when he doesn't need to, doesn't think how he just won't grow tired of the other boy's presence, even when, usually, he would be longing for the comfort of his own room. Doesn't register that that weird off feeling in his stomach might just come from missing Mark.

But being with Mark is comfortable in a way Yuta doesn't quite expect. More so than talking, than interacting, it's simply co-existing in the same space that somehow just works.

When they pile into their room after a finished concert, Yuta feels so relieved when he remembers that Mark is the one he's sharing the room with. Unable to contain himself, he hugs Mark from behind, ruffling his hair with all its residual gel.

Mark jumps, but relaxes quite quickly into Yuta's loose embrace. After a few moments, he turns a little to glance at Yuta with a half-smile. "What's this for?" he asks.

Yuta shrugs and laughs. "Just felt like it," he says, and Marks accepts the explanation without further questions.

It’s easy like that, with the two of them. Even if Mark can’t show all of them around Vancouver, he listens eagerly when Yuta tells him all about it the next day, and when Yuta jokingly makes him promise that next time they can explore it together, Mark just laughs and agrees. When Mark wants someone to help him navigate Moscow for a brief subtle excursion, Yuta immediately volunteers, even though it’s not like he can help Mark with Cyrillic. And despite the lack of free time in Mexico, Yuta wheedles all the Spanish Mark's brain holds out of him, and then some.

It's so easy being away from home that Yuta barely notices how it ends.

*

Almost immediately after coming back from the tour, Mark is whisked away to spend increasingly more time preparing for SuperM's debut. There's still time to relax, sometimes, for some idle chit-chat at the table if not for a nice evening in, and anyway, Yuta finds himself busy too, if not at the same level.

But, possibly because of how used he got to gravitating to Mark during the tour, or by paying too much attention to him, Yuta inevitably grows alarmed when things get worse.

It's hard not to notice how all the schedules are leaving Mark frazzled and ragged to the bone. He falls asleep ten minutes into a movie or an episode, and eventually starts declining offers to watch something together with Yuta or other members. He's distracted at breakfast and dinner, and that's when Yuta even sees him during meals — which is progressively less and less, and he finds himself missing Mark, even when he's snorting milk everywhere because of some silly joke that nobody else found funny. Even if Mark would be a little too loud during movies sometimes. Even if Mark constantly leaves almost-finished milk in the fridge.

He misses Mark a lot, and Yuta really should have known better.

*

Really, the elation he feels when Mark knocks on his door out of the blue one evening is ridiculous.

Easy there, he tells himself, but the urge to run and hug Mark as tight as he can is hard to squash. Maybe because of that, it takes him a moment to realise just how much exhaustion Mark is emanating.

"You okay?" Yuta asks in a careful tone, in lieu of a greeting.

Mark looks startled, as if he didn't expect Yuta to speak.

"Mixed up the doors?" Yuta suggests helpfully, as if Mark didn't knock and wait a couple seconds dutifully before entering.

"N...no," Mark replies, and Yuta watches in fascination as several emotions seem to pass through his typically expressive face. "Just. Not sure I should bother you. Hyung."

He says it in that weird low voice, pausing every few words, like it's a hassle to speak at all. Maybe it is; there are times Yuta can’t find words in any language, doesn’t understand why he should even bother.

He pats his bed, and Mark shuffles closer like an awkward penguin.

"I won't bite," Yuta promises, and Mark cracks a little smile.

Progress.

When Mark finally sits down, it's with the tense energy of an easily spooked cat. Yuta wonders, briefly, if he would flee at any small touch, and decides not to test it for now. Instead, he pulls the earbud cord out of his phone and presses "play".

Soft, melancholic sounds of King Gnu fill the room, and though Mark flinches, he doesn't move.

He also still doesn't speak, and Yuta has to decide whether enduring the increasingly awkward silence or possibly rushing Mark to talk when he isn't ready would be worse.

"You wanna get tea?" he offers, instead; a cop-out. His mom always used to solve things with a cup of tea. Not that it really solved anything per se, but it's like a reflex at this point: the smell, the taste, the whole experience have grounded him as long as he can remember.

(Some days he even prefers it to meditation.)

"Nah, I'm good, hyung," Mark mumbles, still staring at the floor.

Yuta sighs.

"Okaaaay," he announces. "Mark. Mark. Markie. You know I'm here for you, right?"

Wordlessly, Mark nods.

"It's okay if you just wanna sit here together. Or if you wanna watch something even if he haven't done it in a month and a half. Or," Yuta scrambles his mind for any other options, "like, we can listen to music together or something. But it feels like maybe you wanna talk."

Mark groans suddenly and presses the heels of his hands into his eyes.

"I— I know. I know. I don't know why it's so hard to just say shit," he mutters. "Not that I know what to say. It's just. I had a free evening, you know?"

Yuta certainly did not know, but he nods anyway. Not that Mark is even looking at him.

"So I was like. Oh great, I might finally play some guitar because I haven't played in, like. Shit. Like two weeks? I probably lost my callouses. Or maybe I could write to friends I haven't written to in— I'm not even gonna count. Or, like, should I go out? Should I work on my vocals? And like, Hyuck's been begging me to play with him for ages— I don't know why he would even want to, I'm absolutely bullshit at it, oh, right. That must be exactly why." Mark lets out a disbelieving laugh. "And then I remembered I promised to write some lyrics for a friend, you don't know him, a trainee, well, he's not even a friend, I just thought, oh, I could definitely do it, I couldn't say no, right, he was really desperate, and I just forgot—"

Yuta reaches out to grasp his shoulder, but hesitates at the last moment; Mark doesn't even notice, talking faster and faster until Yuta's kinda missing some words here and there (possibly because they're in English, but he's not entirely sure).

"And then I remembered I promised to Taeyong-hyung that I was gonna relax today, so I was like, okay, relaxing, I can do relaxing, I'm gonna relax, totally. But then it was like — what do I even do to relax? I thought I could learn a new song on guitar, maybe, pick something by ear, and I did try that for, like, twenty minutes maybe? But it didn't really relax me, you know, so I thought I could ask someone to watch something together, and then I looked at the messages and they were all, like, texts I didn't answers or work stuff, and I just felt guilty because I could be improving right now, but also I probably pushed everyone away, haha, so that's great—"

"Mark—"

"And I'm sure you didn't really want your evening to be, like, listening to me rant, cause I should be grateful, right, that I have some time off, and I should be grateful to have work, too, and I am, I swear, I just kinda— I don't even know what's wrong, agh, this is really stupid—"

"Mark!" Yuta almost shouts, finally clasping Mark's head in his hands and turning it towards himself. Mark just gapes at him in his best impression of a shocked fish. "Listen. Listen. What we'll do right now is have some tea, okay?"

Mark nods, as much as he can.

"And then we can watch some really chill anime. Or just Youtube videos. Or nothing, even, if you prefer. Just..." he struggles to find the right words. "You don't need to do anything right now. I know there's a lot, and it feels... impossible and insurmountable, but you're Mark Lee, right? Absolutely capable." Yuta grins. "And if you can't do something, that's fine too. Just promise me you'll come to me before you work yourself into a frenzy or pass out from exhaustion?"

"Okay," Mark mouths, hoarse. It's strange, seeing him like this, even if not entirely unfamiliar.

"Or— anyone else. You can come to them too, if you want," Yuta mumbles, weirdly self-conscious all of a sudden, drawing back to give Mark space.

But Mark actually reaches out himself this time, grasping at Yuta until they fold into each other into a weird non-hug.

Yuta would like to hug Mark properly, but he's fine with this, too; whatever works for Mark.

(In hindsight, that could be the tagline of his life.)

Four cups of tea and three episodes of Natsume Yuujinchou later, Mark is valiantly struggling to keep his eyes open, and yet — Yuta doesn't have the heart to simply leave him to his own devices.

Truthfully, it has been a very nice evening — nicer than Yuta's had in a long while. But, well, Mark probably has an early schedule tomorrow, and he has books to finish.

Just as he starts disentangling himself from Mark who's managed to drape himself over Yuta in weird and unusual ways, Mark stirs.

"Thank you, hyung," he mumbles somewhere into Yuta's knee. "You always know how to make me feel better."

Yuta swallows around the heavy warmth that settles in him at these words and pats Mark's hand.

"Any time, Markie."

by [moony](https://twitter.com/fallinfleur/status/1334503872149278723?s=19)

*

Maybe Yuta should have expected it, but from that point on, Mark starts spending more and more time in his presence. They don’t always watch something, or drink tea, for that matter — sometimes all Mark seems to want is someone around to stop him from spiraling.

Yuta is glad to be that.

He doesn’t think much of it until Mark invites him out to the restaurant for the relay live.

It feels, funnily, like a date, which Yuta hasn’t had in… well. Ever. His short-lived affairs before coming to Korea didn’t really come with dates attached, as they consisted mostly of experimental teenagers fumbling.

So okay, Yuta doesn’t even have much room for comparison, so whatever.

Spending time with Mark like that is fun, and he wonders, twirling his pasta onto a fork, why they’ve never done it like that, just the two of them. And truth was, it felt like they were kind of from different worlds, for a long time, despite sharing a lot of the same burdens. Well — that, and Yuta never really thought Mark might want to do those kinds of outings with him, and what Yuta wanted didn’t really matter.

It’s all just a lot of joking around and a lot of fun, and Mark looks very cute when Yuta feeds him with a spoon. Mark has always been cute, though, it's not news to anyone; definitely not to Yuta.

“That was nice,” he says mildly, long after the cameras stopped rolling.

“Mhm,” Mark says, stretching sleepily in the backseat, and Yuta can’t hold a smile. “Thank you, hyung.”

“You did end up paying, though.”

Mark grins at him, and Yuta wishes that every evening ended like this — Mark emanating ease and happiness, looking at Yuta as if he was responsible for it.

“Ah, still.”

Really, he just wishes Mark was this happy more often than not. Selfishly, he wishes he was there to see it, too.

*

Yuta never really bothered to keep his impulses in check, whether it came to ordering a very specific dish at 2 AM or attacking a fellow member with a hug with no prior warning. So when he feels like going for a walk with Mark, he does just that, despite the latter’s feeble protests (something something practice something something, Yuta tunes it out). They walk for hours, kicking at the yellow leaves, Mark buying gamja-hotdogs and Yuta picking up the scarf when Mark almost leaves it on the bench. And when he feels like dropping by Mark’s room armed with snacks and absolute determination to at least start him on Hunter x Hunter, he doesn’t question it either.

When Mark sees Yuta stretching in the common room, stopping in his tracks to stare and presumably spaces out for a while, Yuta simply tosses out a casual invitation to join him, which somehow leads to them doing yoga together. Or, well, trying to. Jungwoo laughs for a long, long time when he finds them later trying to follow some Youtube video — well, Mark is diligently following it while Yuta feels like inventing some new positions of his own, which leads to Mark looking over at him and yelling, all indignant.

Mark playing guitar is a common sight — or rather, a common soundtrack to the dorm life on their floor, by now, so Yuta is not surprised when one day he slips into Mark’s room and Mark just continues playing.

He’s heard him so many times, but hardly really ever stopped to listen properly, and it takes Mark approximately nine minutes to realise just how intently Yuta’s taking him in and promptly lose his usual confident air.

“Ah, did you want something, hyung?” Mark says, and Yuta takes note of how his voice sounds a bit higher when speaking. Or maybe lower? It’s just — different, that’s all.

Yuta hums noncommittally. “Just keep playing.”

And Mark does. He fumbles a little, uncharacteristically, but eventually the novelty of Yuta’s attention must wear off, and Yuta finds himself falling into a sort of a meditative state, somehow utterly enraptured by Mark’s soft singing voice.

Yeah, Mark sounds good, and that’s no surprise, not a discovery, surely, but this is the first time Yuta’s kinda wishing he could maybe just get his phone out and press the recording button.

The next time, he does just that.

*

Mark must like him as an audience, because these guitar sessions keep happening, until one evening, Mark startles him with a, “Wanna learn?”

“Uh?” Yuta offers.

“The guitar. I thought… you know, maybe. That could be… if you want to, you know.” Mark’s voice goes lower and lower, and he’s not looking at Yuta at all.

There’s something in this seemingly innocent proposition that feels strangely dangerous, like Yuta’s taking a step into complete darkness and there’s a chance that the fall will be the end of him. A small, trembling sort of trepidation.

"I'm not sure," Yuta mutters, and Mark's features momentarily settle into confused disappointment. Damn, he’s too cute. "I'm afraid I might get too good and no one will wanna listen to your boring old tunes anymore."

"Oh my god, hyung," Mark exhales in a startled laugh, and it's so Mark, and Yuta is so, so fucked.

He can’t really say no, can he?

Who could say no to Mark?

I’m too busy, Yuta thinks. (He isn’t.) Mark’s too busy. (True, but that didn’t stop Yuta from dragging him out any chance he got.) It’s useless. (So is everything, basically.)

He aims for something quippy, something to poke at Mark, but all that comes out is, “I’d love to.”

It’s too sincere, sounds in the back of his mind as Mark tries to arrange his fingers properly on the fretboard. Too genuine, this moment they’re having, something Yuta’s bound to get attached to. Something he might regret down the line.

But Mark seems so happy to be showing him the simplest of chords, and Yuta doesn’t tell him that he can in fact tell the difference between Am and E — just doesn’t have the heart. Mark’s having too much fun, here, now, teaching his hyung something so dear to him.

Just a little, Yuta thinks. Just a little more is alright.

*

by [moony](https://twitter.com/fallinfleur/status/1334503872149278723?s=19)

So yeah, once or twice a week they find some time for guitar practice. Yuta tries being bad on purpose in the beginning, just for their mutual amusement, but it turns out to be challenging enough without him messing up the rhythm of his strumming and playing everything super fast from the get-go. Mark is a patient teacher, even if it's clear he's figuring it out on the go as well, and his fingers are gentle when they correct Yuta's placement on the fretboard. He lets Yuta suggest songs to practice on and doesn't immediately smack it down even when the level of difficulty is clearly too advanced for a beginner. Instead, he thinks of ways to simplify it, transposing the songs right on the spot, and Yuta watches in unconcealed fascination as Mark mutters under his breath as he gets the new chords down.

"Here, try this," Mark says, handing the guitar back to him, and it takes Yuta a moment to look away from his mouth to the chords and tabs on the paper.

Then, of course, it's time for Mark to leave for SuperM activities in America.

Yuta is reminded of it almost violently when he asks Mark to check out a new Japanese restaurant with him on the weekend and gets a pout in return.

"Oh maaan, I wish," Mark laments, and then laughs a little. "Honestly, I think sometimes I'd rather just stay here and visit a new place with you than go on tour, isn't that wild?"

It is wild — Mark has been looking forward to their concerts for a long time, excited and nervous in turn, but maybe Yuta gets him; there is comfort in the routine, too, even if their life, especially Mark's life, can hardly be called that.

"Ah, no worries, Markie," he tuts, patting Mark on the shoulder. "It'll be here when you come back."

He can ask Johnny out, or Taeyong — no, wait, Taeyong is leaving too.

Briefly, he wishes Jungwoo was here, and immediately berates himself for being selfish.

...He can call him later, though.

Mentally going through the list of members, he doesn't notice how they have shifted into what could almost be called an embrace. He grips Mark's shoulder tighter, feels him stiffen and then relax.

"You okay?" he murmurs.

"Ah, fine, yeah," Mark replies, too fast, and then makes some excuse to flee.

Weird.

*

Night before they're supposed to leave, Mark drops by his room, guitar in tow.

"Shouldn't you be packing?" Yuta asks, befuddled. Surely Mark can't be considering a lesson right now?

Mark laughs in that awkward way of his.

"Ah, I just thought…" he pulls at one of the strings of his hoodie, and Yuta kind of wants to do that, now. "Ah, you know, I just wanted to let you know you could use it while I'm gone? You know, to practice… Well, you don't have to — I'm sure you have things to do, haha, — but just in case you wanna…"

Yuta considers him with amusement.

"And you didn't wanna just tell me? Or like, text me, even?" he teases, unable to help himself.

This weak attempt at a jab cannot disguise the fondness in his voice, and Yuta's not trying. He just wishes he wasn't also conscious of how Mark's presence filled the room, how noticeable his abscence will be in the near future.

"Just in case," Mark repeats, quieter.

Yuta stands up, approaching him slowly, as Mark stares at him, eyes wide behind glasses, looking weirdly small.

"Thank you," Yuta says, unsure why the air feels so heavy all of a sudden.

"Yeah. Um. Yeah," Mark mumbles and then throws his arms around Yuta.

They must hug for no longer than ten, maybe fifteen seconds, but it follows Yuta long into the night, and the next day, when he wakes up, Mark is gone.

**Author's Note:**

> title and quote at the beginning are from one of my favorite King Gnu songs — and, indeed, one of the best songs maybe ever, — [The hole](https://youtu.be/vo2YpWSI40E). Read the translation [here](https://randomeighter.livejournal.com/7429.html).
> 
> I actually have Yuta to thank for my love for King Gnu, since he mentioned & recommended them (a while ago, I don't remember, maybe around a year ago?), so it's totally possible for him to be listening to them, hehe.
> 
> [twitter](https://twitter.com/boldmoonwalk) | [cc](https://curiouscat.me/boldmoonwalk)


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